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The parental bonding as predictive factor for the development of adult psychiatric disorders

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2011

Ettore Favaretto*
Affiliation:
Servizio di Psicologia Medica, Istituto di Psichiatria, Università di Verona, Verona
Stefano Torresani
Affiliation:
Servizio di Psicologia Medica, Istituto di Psichiatria, Università di Verona, Verona
*
Indirizzo per la corrispondenza: Dr. E. Favaretto, Servizio di Psicologia Medica, Istituto di Psichiatria, Università di Verona, Ospedale Policlinico, 37134 Verona. Fax +39-(0)45-585-871.

Summary

Objective — To asses the capacity of the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI) to discriminate between normal subjects and clinical samples and between with different psychiatric diagnosis. Design — The present paper analyzes the studies published between 1979 and 1995, which have used the PBI in normal subjects and clinical samples and have reported the respective means and standard deviations obtained on the two PBI dimensions: affection and control. Multiple comparisons were carried out between the mean scores of affection and control of: 1) samples with the same psychiatric diagnosis (intragroup comparison); 2) samples with different psychiatric diagnoses (intergroup comparison); 3) normal subjects and clinical samples. Results — Of the 46 studies with normal and clinical subjects, 23 studies were selected for the analysis, reporting means and standard deviations and specifying the diagnostic criteria. Samples with the same psychiatric diagnosis had similar affection and control scores. With the exception of bipolar affective disorders and avoidant personality disorders, the prevalent parental style was for all diagnostic groups the affectionless control style. Within the affectionless control style, the PBI discriminated between panic attacks, borderline personality and drug addiction but not between schizophrenia, unipolar depression and anxiety disorder. The PBI discriminated also between normal subjects samples and samples with anxiety disorder, schizophrenia, bipolar affective disorder, personality disorder and drug addiction respectively. Conclusion — The results confirm previous suggestions from single studies that the perceived parental style as measured by the PBI can be considered a good predictor for the presence of psychiatric disorders excluding panic attacks, avoidant personality disorders and unipolar affective disorders. Although the different diagnostic groups do not differ in their perceived parental style (affectionless control), significant differences between some diagnostic groups within this category suggest that the PBI might have some specificity as well.

Riassunto

Scopo — Il presente lavoro analizza gli studi internazionali che hanno utilizzato il Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI) per indagare il legame genitoriale in soggetti sani e affetti da disturbi psichici. Lo studio si propone tre obiettivi. Come prima cosa, il confronto dei punteggi al test, in ogni categoria diagnostica, alla ricerca di un punteggio medio al PBI caratteristico di ogni sindrome clinica. Il secondo obiettivo è rappresentato dalla valutazione delle capacità del PBI nel discriminare tra loro le diverse entità nosografiche sia in termini di punteggio al questionario sia di stile genitoriale. Il confronto degli stili patologici e di quelli normativi indicherà, infine, se l'esposizione alle caratteristiche parentali tipiche di ogni disturbo costituisce un fattore di rischio per lo sviluppo dello stesso. Metodo — Dopo aver selezionato gli articoli confrontabili, si è proceduto al confronto delle medie in ogni gruppo e alla comparazione statistica delle categorie diagnostiche. Per i gruppi clinici, al cui interno non sono emerse differenze di punteggio, è stato calcolato un unico punteggio medio distintivo del gruppo. Ogni entità nosografica è stata quindi paragonata statisticamente ai valori normativi e rappresentata in grafico. Risultati — Il confronto intracategoriale indica una sostanziale somiglianza dei punteggi nei gruppi, con la sola eccezione dei campioni normativi. È stata rilevata la prevalenza dello stile genitoriale affectionless control per tutti i raggruppamenti diagnostici, tranne che per i disturbi affettivo bipolare e di personalità evitante. Il raffronto statistico intercategoriale conferma la non differenziabilità dei punteggi solo per la triade schizofrenia, depressione unipolare e disturbo d'ansia. Conclusioni — La conferma del rischio di manifestare patologie psichiatriche, derivante dall'esposizione all'affectionless control genitoriale, attesta la ben nota capacità predittiva del PBI, pur evidenziandone la limitazione derivante dall'aspecificità del riscontro. Questa non consentirebbe di differenziare il rischio di sviluppare una patologia anziché un'altra, sulla base dello stile genitoriale. Tali risultati meritano una verifica, alla luce di un maggior approfondimento delle differenze genitoriali e intercategoriali.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1997

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